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Opinion: Guest Opinions

Frances Draper and Derek Silva: CU offers to partner with city on critical flood mitigation

By Frances Draper and Derek Silva

Posted:
02/16/2019 07:46:30 PM MST

The view in June 2017 towards the University of Colorado South Campus. (Cliff Grassmick / Staff Photographer)

Boulder City Council is working with its staff to develop a plan for an urgently needed flood mitigation project the city would like to build on University of Colorado property located at Table Mesa and U.S. 36 in south Boulder.

We applaud this council for being the first elected body to advance this work in a substantive way and for focusing on protecting the lives of our neighbors who live north of U.S. 36. In an effort to support the city's timelines, on Feb. 4 the university submitted an early application for the annexation of its 308-acre CU Boulder South property.

CU has no plans to develop the property in the near future and would not have otherwise submitted an annexation application at this time but for the city's request that we do so. With this application, we are pleased to support the community by donating up to 80 acres of our land to the city — an estimated value of $18 million — for implementing flood mitigation. Over the past three years, we have dedicated significant effort to listening to input and sharing information at numerous city council and board meetings and have gathered valuable input through community engagement, outreach and surveys.

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The input we gathered through mid-2017 resulted in a collaborative effort with the city and Boulder County to create guiding principles for the site in the 2015 Major Update to the Boulder Valley Comprehensive Plan. The CU South Guiding Principles establish guidance that will apply to the eventual development of our CU Boulder South property.

Through those principles the university has agreed to height limitations of 55 feet on future buildings, phasing of development, prohibition of some uses — such as agreeing not to build large structures like those at Williams Village on Baseline — and goals for sustainability and transportation, among other considerations.

CU has worked to add to the guiding principles to reflect other requests and benefits to the city. These include agreeing to limit development to only 129 out of the 308 acres on our site and to give the city the opportunity to provide input on the concept design for the site. The focus of development on the 129 acres will be on faculty, staff and graduate/upper division student housing with some nonresidential space.

The university has also agreed that our recreational fields, which will occupy an additional 30 acres, will be available for community use through collaboration with our local partners. Bike and pedestrian trails connecting to city open space trails will be available to the public.

This application reflects three years of negotiation between the university and the four bodies engaged in the approval of the Boulder Valley Comprehensive Plan and, subsequently, directly with the city. It represents significant work and the university's best offer to meet the needs of both the university and the city in an equitable manner.

CU recognizes that the city council has yet to make a final selection of the outline and placement of the flood mitigation project on the university's property. To accommodate flexibility for their process, we have structured our annexation application to allow the city to shift the location of the 129 acres for development and 30 acres for recreational fields on the property. Or they may provide acreage elsewhere or purchase more acreage to accommodate their final flood mitigation project placement, with our agreement.

The university is just beginning the process of developing a comprehensive revision of its Campus Master Plan, covering all of its infrastructure, buildings and land. The Campus Master Plan is anticipated to be complete at the end of 2021. Assuming that the south Boulder property has been annexed by the city, CU will develop a plan for the south Boulder site following completion of the Campus Master Plan.

We believe this project is an urgent life-safety issue for the community, as does the council. We brought our application forward now so that city council could effectively nail down one of three complicated factors in this process while grappling with the other two — working with CDOT for rights of way and making final decisions on the project itself.

CU Boulder is a dedicated member of the Boulder community and always will be, and we look forward to advancing the city's flood mitigation efforts for the greater good of all.

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